God Made All Things (WCF 4.1)

Teaching Note

It is of fundamental importance to remember that God is God and we are not. God’s creation of all things is like our creation of things in this world but also fundamentally different. In contrast to us, he started with absolutely nothing. He is not just a painter using a canvas, but the one who made the paint and canvas. God existed before time and space and matter, completely independent of all things. He freely chose, without any necessity or compulsion of doing so, to create all things, whether visible or invisible. He created exactly as it is revealed to us in Genesis in the space of six days and all very good.

Scripture Verse

For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day… Exodus 20:11

WCF Text

1. It pleased God the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, for the manifestation of the glory of his eternal power, wisdom, and goodness, in the beginning, to create, or make of nothing, the world, and all things therein whether visible or invisible, in the space of six days; and all very good.

Teaching Content

God Freely Created: We so often speak about God as if He is trapped by circumstances and forced into corners by His creation. But God is totally, completely, and utterly free of all dependence on anything outside of Himself. God does not need us because the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are internally sufficient. The Triune God chose to create because to do so was glorious and showed forth His power, wisdom, and goodness. By creating He is showing who He is. (Psalm 115:3, Acts 17:24-25, Romans 11:34-36, Revelation 4:11)

God Made All Things: One of the key differences that has separated the Christian religion from everything else is the universality of its claims about God. God is not the god of a single river or mountain or people or concept, like the pagan gods of old. God’s power is not limited by anything. So when we say that God made all things, we’re not merely making a statement about creation, but about source and authority. “All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made,” (John 1:3). If you make something, you have complete authority over it, and God made all things, visible and invisible. (Psalm 24:1-2, Colossians 1:16-17)

In the Space of Six Days: The Westminster Divines felt this phrase was important to include in the confession because it is scriptural, and because in the history of the church there have been several attempts to undermine this truth. Augustine famously struggled with this passage and taught that God’s creation was instantaneous. The modern world either rejects entirely God’s work in creation or accepts His work only according to schemes and theories they can imagine. Yet, we affirm what the scriptures teach, that God made all things, of nothing, in the space of six days. There is some debate among faithful Reformed men about the nature of those days, but six days remains the biblical account. (Genesis 1:1-31, Exodus 20:11, Hebrews 11:3)

All Very Good: What we find in Genesis 1 is that everything that God made was good. In Genesis 3 man chose sin, which is bad, and so God submitted creation to the curse and the futility of death making our experience of many things become bad, but the flaw is not in creation itself but in Adam’s sin. God made all things very good. Man’s sin brought along the bad things. This is incredibly important for us to remember lest we adopt the pagan philosophy that the flesh is evil and only the spirit good. God made the flesh and spirit good, and what we ultimately long for is a full restoration of both in the New Heavens and New Earth in which righteousness dwells. (Genesis 1:31, Romans 8:20-22, 1 Timothy 4:4-5, 2 Peter 3:13)

Discussion Questions

God Made Man (WCF 4.2)

Teaching Note

Modern science and philosophy have done everything they can to obscure this truth, but man is the capstone of God’s creation. While we share a physical reality formed from the dust alongside the rest of the creatures, we are fundamentally different because God created us with reasonable, immortal souls in His own image. As a result, we bear unique responsibilities toward our Creator and His world. Moreover, contrary to modern ideas, we are not fully independent beings who exist in a vacuum; we live under God’s authority, and as such, we rightly stand under the covenantal consequences of Adam’s headship in the garden.

Scripture Verse

Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. Genesis 1:26–27

WCF Text

1. After God had made all other creatures, he created man, male and female, with reasonable and immortal souls, endued with knowledge, righteousness, and true holiness, after his own image; having the law of God written in their hearts, and power to fulfill it: and yet under a possibility of transgressing, being left to the liberty of their own will, which was subject unto change. Beside this law written in their hearts, they received a command, not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; which while they kept, they were happy in their communion with God, and had dominion over the creatures.

Teaching Content

The Image of God in Man: All creation reflects God in some way and glorifies Him, but man is directly made in the image of God in a unique way. The shorter catechism gives us helpful insight into what it means to be in the image of God, saying “God created man male and female, after his own image, in knowledge, righteousness and holiness, with dominion over the creatures.” The fall marred and defaced the image of God in man, but did not destroy it entirely. It remains, though corrupted, until it is restored by Christ for the elect. This image of God in man is one of the key foundations for why we are to treat our neighbors with love and kindness. It is also why God gives us animals to kill and eat, while forbidding us to take the life of a man, who bears His image. (Genesis 1:26-27, Genesis 9:3-6, Colossians 3:10, James 3:9)

Adam’s Freedom in the Garden: Reformed theology rightly speaks of the different states of man’s freedom: In the garden Adam was able not to sin, after the fall man was not able not to sin, in Christ believers are able not to sin (though not perfectly in this life), and in glory to come believers will not be able to sin. What this gets at fundamentally is our freedom in regards to rebellion against God. And as such, Adam was free in a way that we are not, because there was nothing in his nature, as created by God, that compelled him to sin. He was free to choose between good and evil and freely chose evil. Thus Adam’s nature changed, fundamentally, from able not to sin, to not able not to sin; this is the consequence of the fall. (Genesis 2:16-17, Genesis 3:6-7, Ecclesiastes 7:29)

Adam’s Duty in the Garden: While Adam was free to choose between good and evil, he was obligated to obey God. He was created under the law of God written on his heart, and God then entered into a covenant of works with him, which required personal, perfect, and perpetual obedience, promising life upon obedience and threatening death upon transgression. This included the general rules of the moral law written upon Adam’s heart and the specific command not to eat of one tree. We cannot conceive of how light this duty to obey God was. Adam was in sinless perfection in the garden, for us obedience always brings with it the challenges of living in a broken and cursed world, but for Adam this was not so. As our first father and federal head, Adam made his choice not just for himself but for all of his children and so we have received the guilt of his sin and inherited the corruption… (Hosea 6:7, Romans 2:14-15, Romans 5:12-19)

Discussion Questions